《時代》雜誌評出100部最佳英語小說,你讀了多少本？

評選人是《時代》評論家 Lev Grossman 和 Richard Lacayo，評選時限為1923年（《時代雜誌》創刊的年份）至今，範圍是全世界，語種是英語。100部小說名單如下（依篇名字母排序）：

       The Adventures of Augie March --by Saul Bellow

　　All the King』s Men --by Robert Penn Warren

　　American Pastoral-- by Philip Roth

　　An American Tragedy-- by Theodore Dreiser

　　Animal Farm --by George Orwell

　　Appointment in Samarra --by John O』Hara

　　Are You There God? It』s Me, Margaret-- by Judy Blume

　　The Assistant --by Bernard Malamud

　　At Swim-Two-Birds --by Flann O』Brien

　　Atonement --by Ian McEwan

　　Beloved-- by Toni Morrison

　　The Berlin Stories --by Christopher Isherwood

　　The Big Sleep-- by Raymond Chandler

　　The Blind Assassin-- by Margaret Atwood

　　Blood Meridian --by Cormac McCarthy

　　Brideshead Revisited-- by Evelyn Waugh

　　The Bridge of San Luis Rey --by Thornton Wilder

　　Call It Sleep-- by Henry Roth

　　Catch-22 --by Joseph Heller

　　The Catcher in the Rye-- by J.D. Salinger

　　A Clockwork Orange-- by Anthony Burgess

　　The Confessions of Nat Turner --by William Styron

　　The Corrections --by Jonathan Franzen

　　The Crying of Lot 49 --by Thomas Pynchon

　　A Dance to the Music of Time --by Anthony Powell

　　The Day of the Locust --by Nathanael West

　　Death Comes for the Archbishop --by Willa Cather

　　A Death in the Family --by James Agee

　　The Death of the Heart --by Elizabeth Bowen

　　Deliverance --by James Dickey

　　Dog Soldiers-- by Robert Stone

　　Falconer --by John Cheever

　　The French Lieutenant』s Woman --by John Fowles

　　The Golden Notebook-- by Doris Lessig

　　Go Tell it on the Mountain --by James Baldwin

　　Gone With the Wind --by Margaret Mitchell

　　The Grapes of Wrath --by John Steinbeck

　　Gravity』s Rainbow-- by Thomas Pynchon

　　The Great Gatsby-- by F. Scott Fitzgerald

　　A Handful of Dust-- by Evelyn Waugh

　　The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter --by Carson McCullers

　　The Heart of the Matter --by Graham Greene

　　Herzog --by Saul Bellow

　　Housekeeping --by Marilynne Robinson

　　A House for Mr. Biswas --by V.S. Naipaul

　　I, Claudius --by Robert Graves

　　Infinite Jest --by David Foster Wallace

　　Invisible Man --by Ralph Ellison

　　Light in August --by William Faulkner

　　The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe --by C.S. Lewis

　　Lolita-- by Vladimir Nabokov

　　Lord of the Flies-- by William Golding

　　The Lord of the Rings --by J.R.R. Tolkein

　　Loving --by Henry Green

　　Lucky Jim-- by Kingsley Amis

　　The Man Who Loved Children --by Christina Stead

　　Midnight』s Children-- by Salman Rushdie

　　Money-- by Martin Amis

　　The Moviegoer --by Walker Percy

　　Mrs. Dalloway-- by Virginia Woolf

　　Naked Lunch --by William Burroughs

　　Native Son-- by Richard Wright

　　Neuromancer --by William Gibson

　　Never Let Me Go --by Kazuo Ishiguro

　　1984 --by George Orwell

　　On the Road --by Jack Kerouac

　　One Flew Over the Cuckoo』s Nest-- by Ken Kesey

　　The Painted Bird --by Jerzy Kosinski

　　Pale Fire --by Vladimir Nabokov

　　A Passage to India --by E.M. Forster

　　Play It As It Lays --by Joan Didion

　　Portnoy』s Complaint-- by Philip Roth

　　Posession --by A.S. Byatt

　　The Power and the Glory-- by Graham Greene

　　The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie-- by Muriel Spark

　　Rabbit, Run --by John Updike

　　Ragtime --by E.L. Doctorow

　　The Recognitions-- by William Gaddis

　　Red Harvest-- by Dashiell Hammett

　　Revolutionary Road --by Richard Yates

　　The Sheltering Sky --by Paul Bowles

　　Slaughterhouse-Five-- by Kurt Vonnegut

　　Snow Crash --by Neal Stephenson

　　The Sot-Weed Factor --by John Barth
--
　　The Sound and the Fury-- by William Faulkner

　　The Sportswriter-- by Richard Ford

　　The Spy Who Came in From the Cold --by John LeCarre

　　The Sun Also Rises --by Ernest Hemingway

　　Their Eyes Were Watching God --by Zora Neale Hurston

　　Things Fall Apart-- by Chinua Achebe

　　To Kill a Mockingbird --by Harper Lee

　　To the Lighthouse --by Virginia Woolf

　　Tropic of Cancer --by Henry Miller

　　Ubik --by Philip K. Dick

　　Under the Net-- by Iris Murdoch

　　Under the Volcano --by Malcolm Lowrey

　　Watchmen --by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons

　　White Noise --by Don DeLillo

　　White Teeth --by Zadie Smith

　　Wide Sargasso Sea --by Jean Rhys

I found "The Bridge of San Luis Rey --by Thornton Wilder" over-rated. I went in with great expectation (after reading a reference to that book from another book "When bad things happen to good people."

I read "ortnoy』s Complaint" about 30 years ago, or I should say, 3/4 of it. After a while, it becomes boring. I read the Lord of the Rings many, many years ago (at least 30), and almost gave it up after the first 20 pages when I found it extremely boring.  The the "Hobbit" came out, and I read that. With that under my belt, I developed a new interest in the series and went back to finish all three volumes the Lord of the Rings.
  My taste is not very literal, I read mostly for entertainment. That's why I read almost exclusively science fiction and mysteries. Only once in a while I read something of literary value.
  Both Doctor Zhivago and Hundred Year Solitude are good, but I guess they are translated from Russian and Spanish so they are not included in the list.

Here is something from O'Hara's Appointment In Samara that you will find interesting.
(I have posted this previously at Rainlane: Appointment in Samara and Journey Up the Canal of Life. http://www.rainlane.com/dispbbs. ... 19&star=1#10805  第 2 樓 Appointment in Samara第 3 樓  Journey Up the Canal of Life)

Appointment In Samara
This is the fable at the beginning of a short story  written by John O'Hara in 1934. It has been retold and reprinted in many slightly different forms, including a French version in which the name of the city is Toulouse instead of Samara.  The story is about the inevitability of fate.The particular version below is taken from the science fiction novel, "A Far Sunset" (*)by Edmund Cooper. In the story, the lone survivor of a survey ship that crashed on an alien planet, and rescued by aliens in primitive culture society, recounted the story of "Appointment in Samara."  (Yeti, Sep 26th 2005. )(* Book review by Yeti:   #12 A Far Sunset, by Edmund Cooper http://www.rainlane.com/dispbbs.asp?boardid=11&id=17021
)

Appointment in Samara .

The servant of a rich man in Baghdad or Basra, or some place like that, went out to do a day's shopping.  But in the market place he met Death, who gave him a strange sort of look... Well the servant chased off home and said to his master: "Lord, in the market place I met Death, who look as if he were about to claim me. Lend me your fastest horse that I may ride to Samara, which I can reach before night-fall, and so escape him."   

  The rich man lent the servant his horse, and he duly set off for Samara at a great rate of knots. But when he had gone, the rich man thought: "This is a bit of a bore. My servant is a jolly good servant, I shall miss him. Death has no right to give him the twitches. I think I'll pop down to the market place and give the old fellow a piece of my mind."     

   So the rich man went to the market place and button-holed Death. "Look here," he said, "What do you mean by giving my servant the shakes?"  Death was amused. He said: "Lord, I merely looked at the fellow in surprised."    "Why so?" asked the rich man. "He is just an ordinary servant".    " I look at him in surprise." explained Death, "because I did not expect to find him here. You see, I have an appointment with him this evening--- in Samara."

[QUOTE=TheYeti3]I found "The Bridge of San Luis Rey --by Thornton Wilder" over-rated. I went in with great...[/QUOTE]

From my standpoint, there were more than twenty on the list being over-rated. I rarely read the classics or kind of famous novels. I read best selling novels daily, first for fun, and then for language and culture learning. Here are the books I have read since July:

1.The Innocent by Harlan Coben        7/06
2.Crime Beat by Michael Connelly        7/06
3.Just One Look by Harlan Coben        7/06
4.Gone for Good by Harlan Coben        7/06
5.No Second Chance by Harlan Coben        7/06
6.Tell No One by Harlan Coben        8/06
7.Blood is the Sky by Steve Hamilton        8/06

I do agree with TheYeti3 's opinion, and I also found some of them  a little bit boring. I have a keen interest on science fiction and mysteries too though I only read very few of them.

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